One star, two star - Otis star!

Otis is growing up!

It's fascinating watching them develop. They do this in so many ways. They grow physically, sure, but their characters start to emerge and you see them learning as they spend more time with their Volunteer Puppy Trainers.

In Otis's case, he's definitely growing up physically. His volunteer Rachel shared this photo and says: "As Otis grows, it’s time to upgrade to a bigger cardboard box. As you can see this has significant teeth and claw marks. Thank goodness it wasn’t a sofa!"

We thought it might be fun to contrast this with a photo we showed you in an earlier Pupdate:

Yes, it appears he's upgraded from Dr Martens, and we don't think it will be too long before he needs to find an even bigger cardboard box.

Otis is also experiencing the world and what we're finding is that he gets on pretty well with it!

Here he is meeting a rabbit...

... and here he is not so much meeting ducks as 'experiencing' them!

He's also playing very nicely with other puppy pals. This is a fab photo with another puppy. They look so happy together!

Otis has been brought up really well by Rachel and her family. It's the safe, secure domestic home they provide, which helps Otis have a good, strong foundation for building on. They've been taking him to puppy classes and showing him that, if he plays nicely and is a good Otis, he'll get treats, fusses, tickle-tums - the whole 'good boy' treatment. If he doesn't, then he's just ignored, not punished in any way. We call this 'reward-based training' and it's clearly working.

In fact, it's working so well that Otis passed his Puppy One Star...

... and cruised through his Puppy Two Star!

The photo above shows Ethan, Rachel's son, helping Otis proudly display his certificate.

Rachel jokes: "Otis wasn’t up for holding the certificate himself!"

Well, we wouldn't put it past him Rachel. He seems pretty capable of doing anything and everything else we ask of him!

That's all for now. He's doing so well and we're all really proud of him. You should be too, because you've helped him get so far. From all of us, once more, thank you for sponsoring Otis.